The Villagers Grant
The Coral Gables Garden Club has had the privilege of receiving a generous grant from The Villagers, to restore the original entry door of our garden center, the historic guardhouse at the Biltmore Hotel. The Villagers, a not-for-profit organization in Miami Dade County, dedicates its work to historic preservation and has helped many significant historic properties achieve recognition by the National Register of Historic Places. To date, more than 150 projects have been funded by The Villagers.
On September 29th, 2018, then President of the garden club, Betsy Tilghman, applied for a grant which was approved on November 26th, 2018, with a two-year deadline to complete the project. Austin Historical, a well-respected restoration and preservation company, was contracted to restore the historic front door.
After extensive planning and permitting under the supervision of then President, Judy Mangasarian, the project was completed on June 11th, 2020. Upon submitting all the relevant documents to the 3rd VP for Preservation Projects, April Matteini, the Villager committee approved the completion of the project and sent the grant of $4000.00 to the garden club in October of 2020.
In 2021, then-President Susan Rodriguez applied for a grant to help with the restoration of the garden center, which was given to the club by the City of Coral Gables in 1989. The garden center went under a complete renovation under her leadership. Once again, with the assistance of 3rd VP April Matteini, Chair of the Grant Committee, the Villagers approved funding to help with the Air Conditioning costs of a historic building for $4,000.
We are so grateful for these grants and our relationship with The Villagers over the years. Many of our members are Villager members, so we share a common bond of community and dedication to preserving and conserving what is most important to our club's mission.
We are thrilled to acknowledge their website on our website as well as on FB and Instagram and want to share with all our members the wonderful work the Villagers do, year after year.
